USDA Forest Service Roadless Areas: Potential Biodiversity Conservation Reserves

Abstract

ABSTRACT. In January 2001, approximately 23 x 10 6 ha of land in the U.S. National Forest System were slated to remain roadless and protected from timber extraction under the Final Roadless Conservation Rule. We examined the potential contributions of these areas to the conservation of biodiversity. Using GIS, we analyzed the concordance of inventoried roadless areas (IRAs) with ecoregion-scale biological importance and endangered and imperiled species distributions on a scale of 1:24,000. We found that more than 25% of IRAs are located in globally or regionally outstanding ecoregions and that 77% of inventoried roadless areas have the potential to conserve threatened, endangered, or imperiled species. IRAs would increase the conservation reserve network containing these species by 156%. We further illustrate the conservation potential of IRAs by highlighting their contribution to the conservation of the grizzly bear (Ursos arctos), a wide-ranging carnivore. The area created by the addition of IRAs to the existing system of conservation reserves shows a strong concordance with grizzly bear recovery zones and habitat range. Based on these findings, we conclude that IRAs belonging to the U.S. Forest Service are one of the most important biotic areas in the nation, and that their status as roadless areas could have lasting and far-reaching effects for biodiversity conservation.

Future changes in fire weather, spring droughts, and false springs across U.S. National Forests and Grasslands

“…Lands managed by the U.S. Forest Service deliver important benefits to local communities and to the Nation, and provide habitat for many species and biotic communities of conservation concern (Groves et al 2000, Loucks et al 2003, Stein et al 2008, Caldwell et al 2014. Can Forest Service lands retain the benefits to both humanity and biodiversity under future climates?…”

Connectivity Conservation

“…Wildlife habitat on private lands increases the effective size of the nation's reserve network and thereby enhances both ecosystem integrity and the conservation of biodiversity (DeVelice & Martin, 2001;Loucks et al, 2003;Noss et al, 1999;). The public versus private ownership of core habitat areas that we have identified varies considerably, but over a third of the areas are in management regimes that offer no specified legal protection.…”

“…An exception to this observation were the large industrial forests of Maine, which have undergone recent changes in ownership (over 11,000 km 2 in the period 1994 to 2005) that resulted in much less land use focused solely on commercial timber production (Hagan et al, 2005). We note that private lands were not systematically surveyed for development of the protected areas database (Loucks et al, 2003), likely leading to an underestimate of the extent of core area on private lands that falls under some sort of protected status, although feesimple holdings of conservancies were included. National conservation organizations and numerous regional, state, and local land trusts are placing lands under conservation easements across the Eastern U.S. (Aldrich & Wyerman, 2006).…”

Relationships between avian richness and landscape structure at multiple scales using multiple landscapes

“…Finally, roads are an inevitable by-product of most forest management regimes. Very little is known about whether roads associated with forest management have a negative impact on bird communities, but they are widely believed to affect biodiversity adversely (Strittholt and Dellasala, 2001;DeStefano, 2002;Loucks et al, 2003).…”